Katie Packer Gage, Romney’s deputy campaign manager, said Romney could gain the presidency without Michigan, but said there is no scenario where Obama is again victorious without the Wolverine State in his win column.

“If we can stop Barack Obama in Michigan, we can stop Barack Obama,” she said during a morning address on the convention floor.

Gage dismissed reports that the campaign is pulling out of Michigan after some conservative PACs rescheduled advertising.

Before the speech, she said Michigan has 22 “victory centers” across the state and has extended more than 1 million voter contacts — sixth most in the country.

“Where is the Obama team in Michigan?” she asked. “Where are his television ads? We saw his organization in 2008, but we don’t see it today.”

She pointed to last month’s rally with Romney and vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan in Commerce Township that drew nearly 10,000 people as a sign of support in the state and said the ticket has drawn similar-sized crowds in other states.

Gage said the campaign is focusing now on other swing states, such as Ohio and Florida, but plans to ramp up spending in Michigan and other states where polls are close as Election Day draws closer.

In the state where he was born and where his father once served as governor, Mitt Romney has trailed Obama in most polls this year. But the race there is considerably tighter than in 2008, when Obama won by 16 points, and the polling has been all over the place.

In one 24-hour period in late July, for example, three different polls were released — one that showed a dead heat, one that gave Obama a 6-point lead and another that put the president up by a huge 14-point margin.

The two most recent polls have followed the same pattern. A late August survey by Mitchell Research, dismissed by critics as a GOP-oriented firm, reported a 47-47 tie. Yet a week later, on Sept. 3, the Democratic firm Public Policy Polling painted a very different picture — a 51-44 Obama lead.